How Five U.S. Cafes Set Their Hours: Closing Time as a Business Decision

A cafe's schedule is not simply a matter of convenience. For owners, when the doors open and when they lock up reflects foot traffic patterns, staffing realities, and the bottom line.

Reading those patterns is rarely simple. Weather, seasons, commuter flow, and school calendars all shift demand—yet operating hours carry real weight for long-term profitability. Five owners around the U.S. described what shapes their decisions.

Old Town Coffee

City: Santa Barbara, California Hours: 7 a.m. – 6 p.m. daily

Old Town Coffee used to keep late hours in Santa Barbara, but in November 2023 the shop changed course. It had been open until 10:00 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday. Co-owner Rachel Ward found the evening trade did not generate enough profit to justify the late shift. "After running the numbers with payroll and needing cleaners to come out in the middle of the night, we’ve changed our hours so that we’re open every night until 6 p.m.," Ward says.

After obtaining a beer and wine license three years earlier, the shop tested later hours, but the pieces never fit together. Old Town will still stay open late for special events such as live bands or comedy shows. Safety was another reason for pulling back. "We would just have one employee there at the beginning of staying open until 10:00, but I don’t think it’s safe for people to work by themselves," Ward says.

The shop added a second closing shift, then concluded after six months that the arrangement did not make financial sense. A daily 6 p.m. close, Ward says, brings consistency across the week. "Most [neighborhood] coffee shops close at five, and this gives students and commuters an extra hour to come in and grab something to drink before they drive home."

Deeper Roots Coffee

City: Cincinnati, OH Hours: Three locations; hours vary by location Oakley: Mon-Fri: 6:30 a.m. – 6 p.m. | Sat: 7:30 a.m. – 6 p.m. | Sun: 7:30 a.m. – 4 p.m. Findlay: Every Day: 7 a.m. – 6 p.m. 4th Street: Mon-Fri: 6:30 a.m. – 6 p.m. | Sat-Sun: 7:30 a.m. – 4 p.m.

Jon Lewis, co-owner of Deeper Roots Coffee, describes setting opening hours as more art than science. The company's three Cincinnati shops each run on a different schedule. In some neighborhoods, Sunday afternoon belongs to families and traffic drops off. The 4th Street location downtown sits next to a busy historic market that stays open until 6 p.m. on weekends.

Longer hours can bring in more customers, but Lewis puts employee well-being first. "You could always gain some customers by extending hours," he says. "There’s always somebody who wishes you would open earlier, but what we try to do is really consider our team and what extending hours means for them."

Lewis and his team staff the stores so that employees feel supported and can work efficiently. "It doesn’t make sense to try to stretch people too thin," he says. Typically one person opens the cafe and handles coffee service for the first 30 minutes to an hour. Sales figures inform staffing choices, but Lewis also weighs how a fully staffed bar shapes the customer experience. "We’re looking at the numbers, but also how good a customer experience is when one person gets a little busy," he says. "We keep pretty close tabs on the staff to make sure that people experience or feel the support that they need as baristas."

Hexe Coffee Co.

When Hexe Coffee Co. reopened after lockdowns, owner Parker Slade saw that most commuter traffic had disappeared. The shop moved its opening from 6:00 a.m. to 7:30 a.m., and Slade soon found the later start more profitable. "We actually made more money because we didn’t have to pay people to stand around for that first hour," Slade says.

Hexe Coffee Co. is a well-known night spot in Chicago, and its hours shift with the season. "People know that we’re open late—a lot of guests say they come to us because we’re open past all these coffee shops that close at 2:00 or 3:00," Slade says. "During the summer, when it stays light later outside, we’re open as late as we can stay."

In warm months, that can mean staying open until 10:00 p.m. on weeknights, with live music on Thursdays and extended hours all year. When Chicago's cold winters arrive and the sun sets around 4:00 p.m., Slade shortens the schedule. "Since it’s getting colder, we’re going to start closing earlier because people aren’t coming and staying out late in the winter," Slade says. "We’re probably going to shorten it by an hour because we lose a little money by staying open too late."

Ghost Note Coffee

When Ghost Note Coffee opened in 2017, the team set hours by researching nearby shops. "That was pretty much our starting point," says owner Christos Andrews. "If it felt like the last hour or two were consistently extremely slow or busier than average, we could make that adjustment as needed."

These days the shop typically winds down around 6 p.m., though on Tuesdays it closes at 3:00 p.m. That early close creates room for work that is hard to do during busy periods. "Every Tuesday closing shift, we have tasks like washing the windows, cleaning the floor drain, washing the floor mats," Andrews says. "We also use that early closing to do equipment maintenance, catch up on production, and any shop improvements."

Closing early may cost some revenue, but Andrews does not intend to change Tuesday's hours. "It’s way more valuable to close a little early that day and preserve the last two hours for shop improvement that’s harder to do the rest of the week."

Five Watt Coffee

City: Minneapolis, Minnesota Hours: Four locations; hours vary by location: Kingfield, Lyndale, E. Hennepin: 7 a.m. – 6 p.m. daily Keg & Case: 7 a.m. – 5 p.m. daily

After the pandemic, owner Lee Carter rethought operating hours across his four Five Watt Coffee locations. "One of the things I learned is that closing early is really nice," he says. "It’s less demanding on the staff, easier to schedule, and everyone has the opportunity to have a night to themselves."

All Five Watt locations once stayed open from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. Because evenings were never especially busy, Carter concluded that closing earlier would help both the business and the staff.

Carter settled on closing times by studying sales figures, especially the final hour before closing. "If we do a certain amount in sales, it makes closing [at a particular hour] take a really long time," he says. One store, for instance, may see a rush between 4 and 5 p.m., which complicates a 5 p.m. close. Customers still come in from 5 to 6 p.m., but business eases gradually over that hour.

"It becomes worth it to push things an hour past your last lively hour, so you have some runway to get started on your close," Carter says. "If you close right after a busy hour, you don’t save very much on labor because that close is going to take significantly longer to do. Whereas if you stay open through a slower last hour, the closing person can get ahead of things, and the close can be fast and smooth once we lock the doors."